Miami Law News Headlines: May 2014

Week of May 26-30

(Posted: 05-28-14) It is well known that the Miami metropolitan area is home to one of the greatest wealth divides in the country. For rising 3L and Miami Public Interest Scholar Nejla Calvo, this growing wealth divide and lack of access to justice for some of the community’s poorest provided a call for action and community lawyering.

(Posted: 05-28-14) In partnership with the Bankruptcy Bar of the Southern District of Florida and the Put Something Back Pro Bono Program, Miami Law will hold the 24nd Annual Bankruptcy Skills Workshop on June 6.

(Posted: 05-28-14) William VanderWyden, Assistant Dean for Professional Development, was recently honored by the Catholic Lawyers Guild of Miami with its "Lex Christi, Lex Amoris Award." Previous recipients have included Judges Beatrice Butchko, Aldalberto Jordan, Vance Salter, and Federico Moreno. The award recognizes Catholics in the legal profession who pursue justice in their daily lives.

Week of May 19-23

(Posted: 05-20-14) If Laurie Silvers could have a superpower, it would be the same as her comic book hero, Lady Justice, “where any woman has the super powers to affect her world; to use an intellectual ‘superpower’ that she didn’t know she had to correct an injustice and improve our world,” she said.

(Posted: 05-20-14) Drew Aiken, JD ’12, was recently awarded a grant from the Fulbright Program to examine the impact of customary law on women in several different tribes in Namibia. Aiken first became interested in Namibia while a student at Miami Law when she participated as a 1L in the Namibia Neutral Trial Observer Initiative, a program offered by HOPE in 2010.

(Posted: 05-20-14) Miami Law alumnus Stuart Markus began practicing law in Miami in 1958 and worked as a trial attorney for 55 years. He was well-known for representing the “little guy,” often without accepting a fee. He was “the last small-town lawyer in this big town,” said Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Milton Hirsch, a longtime friend. After his death in late 2013 at age 81, his family established the Markus Award at Miami Law, which recognizes a student each year for outstanding work in one of the Law School’s in-house clinics.

Week of May 12-16

(Posted: 05-16-14)A gift from University of Miami Board of Trustee member, co-founder and president of Hollywood Media Corporation, and Miami Law alumna, Laurie Silvers and her husband, Mitchell Rubenstein, will establish two scholarships supporting students at the University of Miami School of Law. Silvers and Rubenstein have generously provided this gift in support of Momentum2: The Breakthrough Campaign for the University of Miami.

(Posted: 05-13-14) Members of the Greater Miami legal community joined the local ACLU chapter Friday evening to honor the Pottinger Team, including Miami Law Professor Stephen J. Schnably. Schnably was co-counsel for the ACLU, along with Benjamin Waxman, JD ’83, in Pottinger v. City of Miami. The Pottinger consent decree, in place since 1998, protects the right of homeless individuals to not be arrested simply for being homeless. The Pottinger team successfully defended the decree against a recent effort by the City of Miami to eliminate its core protections for most homeless people.

(Posted: 05-13-14)Professor Charlton Copeland has received a 2013 Dukeminier Award and the Michael Cunningham Prize for his article, “Creation Stories: Stanley Hauerwas, Same-sex Marriage, and Narrative in Law and Theology,” which was published in the Duke Law School journal, Law and Contemporary Problems, at the end of 2012.

Week of May 5-9

(Posted: 05-06-14) Three Miami Law students have been selected for The Hispanic National Bar Association (HNBA)/Microsoft IP Law Institute in Washington, D.C. Rising 2L Dalisi Otero and rising 3Ls Lauren Gonzalez and Trisha Ojea were selected to participate in this highly competitive immersion program in early June.

(Posted: 05-06-14)Corey Gray grew up in Palm Beach County, alternating between his mother’s house and grandparents' farm near the eastern edge of the Everglades. The family grew row crops, and from the age of five, everyone was expected to do their part.